The Mystery Song

The Chevy van’s engine hummed as we as we sped along the 10 Freeway toward L.A.  I was riding in the back with my butt on a Sunn amplifier, it being my turn.  It had been well over two hours since we’d left the Big Bear cabin and my cramped legs were now pins and needles. The ride down the snowy mountain had been harrowing but after hitting level ground I’d closed my eyes and let the motor’s drone put my mind in a far-away place. I felt as if I were being hurtled through time to some unknown destiny. Indeed, 1968 seemed to be racing to the finish line. Where were we all headed? The war, the draft the assassinations, the riots – it was just too much to take in. For our little band the year had also featured our hard, creative slog being rewarded with a hit record. Oh, what a heady elation it was; redemption seemed just around the corner. Unfortunately, it had been followed by lost opportunity and disappointment. To top it all off, in a final crazy spasm the year had somehow spewed out Richard Nixon, who was to take the oath of office in January. At the thought of this, I chose to focus my mind on the more immediate future.

What’s this song we’re going to record tonight? I wondered.

Supposedly, it was for some new Paramount T.V. show. Our manager/producer, Dan Dalton, hadn’t given us much info when he’d called the night before. He just knew it was a ‘hundred percent sure thing’.
Isn’t it always? I thought.

‘Brew 102, Boys’ – Casey shouted from the driver’s seat.
Our drummer was always most comfortable with his hands on the reigns of a given situation.

My brother Jimmy was riding shotgun.

‘You can pay more but you can’t find a better beer.’ –  he responded, mocking the radio spot for the regional budget brew.

From my perch behind Jimmy I had no view, but I could smell the seductive aroma of barley mash. Passing the brewery meant we were at the Interchange. Downtown L.A. was to our left and Hollywood was just a few miles ahead on the 101. Man, it would be good just to get out and stretch.  I put my hand on top of the passenger seat and pulled myself up until I was half standing. With my head between Jimmy and Greg, our dark-haired guitarist, who was sitting on the engine cover between the buckets I now could see the scenery rush by. After a few minutes I caught a glimpse of the iconic Capital Records building – a tall stack of records shimmering in the clear December air. It took my breath away.

We turned off the freeway and headed south on Vine. As we made the right turn on Sunset, I could see young people milling about in front of Wallach’s Music City.  Long-haired and attractive, they were chatting, flirting and looking to be seen – the flower of Hollywood Hippiedom. To their left sat a grotesque looking man, obese and toothless, wearing dirty blue overalls and a railroad cap.  He was hawking newspapers to passersby.

‘Get your paper here!’ he barked, his bulldog jowls quivering.

Just west of Cahuenga we hung a U and found a parking space, got out, stretched, and made our way on foot through an arched entryway into the Moo Ling restaurant’s shady open-air courtyard. The double-tired fountain in the center of the space trickled a calming cadence. Compared to the buzz of Sunset this place felt absolutely peaceful. We made an immediate right and mounted the stairway that led to a gallery of second floor office suites. Dan’s suite was at the back, directly above the restaurant. It was nearly lunch hour and down below a few customers sat sipping drinks and eyeballing menus. The smell of fried rice and wonton soup reminded me that It had been a while since I’d last eaten.

We marched single file through the door and into the room with a kind of chaotic swagger. It was a statement of sorts. After all, we were the darlings of the production company; an entitlement we felt we’d earned. it was our hit record that had made it possible for Dan to move from a broom closet office on Selma to this charming location and be able to drive a spankin’ new Mustang up to that mountain retreat on weekends. But the swagger was also born of a deep insecurity about the future.

We entered to the sound of laughter, apparently having just missed a joke. A woman in her mid-twenties with a blond pixie cut was seated on a wooden church bench against the right wall. Lois, a singer in her own right, was married to Dan. Although there was only a six-or seven-year age gap between us it seemed huge at the time. Standing to her left with his back to the door was a heavy-set man in rumpled white shirt and black slacks. Sid Kessler was a friend of Lois’s, a fellow Canadian.

‘Hoo, hoo, hoo!’ he laughed in high falsetto pitch, gesticulating wildly with his hands.

Upon hearing us he turned. His jovial face was rosy as he tried to contain his giggling.  We were fond of Sid, who was interning with Dalton to learn the ropes of the music business.  About our age, he had ambitions to be a player but, unlike so many in the biz, he was genuinely warm and friendly. At the sight of us he gave a wave.

‘There you guys are!’  Lois said. ‘Oh, this is such a good opportunity – this song. It’s exciting.’ I’ll pop in and tell Dan you’re here.’ She opened a door on the left and disappeared.

‘So, are you gentlemen turning into mountain men up there at the Dalton’s cabin?’ Sid asked.

‘Yea, full of piss and vinegar!’ Casey barked with a crazy-eyed look.’

‘Don’t mind him.’ Greg said, patting Casey on the back. ‘He’s suffering from cabin fever like the rest of us.’

‘We’ve been doing a lot of wood shedding. Got some new stuff worked up.’ I interjected.

‘I’d love to hear it.’

‘Hey Sid, did you see the Elvis special? Jimmy asked.

The week before we had all gathered around a little black and white TV to watch the show. We were not disappointed. Elvis seemed to ooze raw sensual energy. Man, did he ever rock! It was inspiring, especially to a group of musicians wanting to tap into that kind of energy and reinvent themselves.

Before he could respond, Lois appeared at the door to beckon us in.

Dan was sitting behind his desk, phone to his ear. He waved as we filed in to take seats on oak chairs and bench.

‘Fine, thank you. Fine.’ He spoke into the receiver with a twinkle in the voice.  ‘And yourself?’

Tall, red-haired and built like an athlete, Dan Dalton was an imposing presence. In his early thirties, he was smart, sociable and blessed with an Irish gift of gab. I mean the man could probably charm his way into Fort Knox. Without question he’d opened a lot of doors for us. But here we were without an agent, without bookings, and living in an Echo Park rental house with no refrigerator.

I swept my eyes across the room. It was decorated to the Daltons’ taste – a kind of antique flavored minimalism. Here an old Victrola, there an ancient upright piano. Everything was tastefully placed, creating a vibe that was funky but clean and hip for the time. A framed copy of the Billboard Hot 100 from July with our record at number 60 was hanging prominently on the wall.

After a few minutes Dan brought the conversation to a close and hung up the phone. ‘So, you boys ready to make some moolah?’ We are doing a major prime time TV theme. Did I do good, or what?’

We all nodded.

He got up and walked over to a tape machine which sat upright against a wall. The reel of tape was already threaded and ready to go.

‘I’ve got to tell you, though. Burt Bacharach it ain’t. In fact, it’s a little wacky. So steady, boys.’

He pressed ‘play’.

To our astonishment what came out was the voice of a middle- aged man, a non-singer with no accompaniment.  It sounded like some really square guy singing in the shower.

‘Here’s the story’ the man began… ‘of a lovely lady…’

We looked at each other with puzzlement written across our faces; stunned by the shear triteness of the ditty.

“…who was bringing up three very lovely girls.’

Greg shook his head with bewildered smile.

‘What the fuck?’

At that, the dam suddenly burst and the four of us broke out in spontaneous and unconstrained laughter.

A Gig is a Gig

We were aware of who Sherwood Schwartz was. In the summer of 1967 we had appeared in an episode of ‘The Beverly Hillbillies’ playing the hippie band at a ‘Love In’. We now were told that this successful sitcom producer was the voice on the tape, the square dude in the shower. He’d written the words and melody.

Thinking back I remembered that his shows – ‘The Beverly Hillbillies’, ‘Green Acres’. ‘Gilligan’s Island’ – always spelled out the situation of the show in the theme song.  Ditto here. But the former were Bach and Beethoven compared to this. The word ‘amateurish’ best described it. It reminded me of something a fourth grader might extemporize on the spot or one of Wild Man Fisher’s crazy little ditties.

Needless to say, this joke of a tune was not what we were hoping for. Creatively, we were experiencing a second wind and had resolved to bust out of the little box we found ourselves in.  We were champing at the bit to do quality things, to record and perform music that reflected the real world (for us a counterculture world) and to ride an artistic crest into the future.

But… a gig is a gig. Hey, they wanted us. How often does that happen? It was time to roll up our sleeves and do our best to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.

After dropping by our pad in Echo Park to visit with and mollify our girlfriends who were justifiably angry at being abandoned in the city while we cloistered ourselves in the mountains – a whole other story – we drove to Western Recorders near the corner of Western and Sunset for the session.

We hauled in and set up our gear and band and producer immediately got down to the business of putting together an arrangement. Time was of the essence. A meager two hours had been booked, giving little time in which to shape and record the song.

The demo had no instrumental backing, so we needed to come up with chords that worked. That proved to be fairly easy.  Next step was to pick a key.  As both our hit, ‘Baby, You Come Rollin’ Across my Mind’, and the follow up, ‘Trust’, were recorded in ‘A’, we went with that.

The tempo took more figuring. The song had to run in a minute slot. The structure broke down thus: a one bar intro followed by three verses of eight bars each followed by a refrain – “The Brady Bunch, the Brady Bunch’ – of six bars. The second verse turned out to be irregular and we had to cut out two beats to accommodate the awkward line ‘…four men living all together; yet they were all alone’. It all added up to 30.5 bars. It was calculated that 122 beats per minute would get us in and out in the allotted time.

We decided on a modulation up to Bb for the last verse, ‘‘til the one day when the lady met this fellow’.
Corny and obvious but it worked!

We cut the basic track live. Keyboard, bass, drums and guitar. Dan wanted that bright clavinet sound that was featured on our album, but a few weeks earlier, I had traded my clav in on an R.M.I. electric piano. Fortunately, the piano also had a harpsichord setting; I used that, playing fours on the intro and throughout the song.

After a few passes we managed get a complete basic. Following that we cut a track for a thirty-second reprise of the refrain with modulated repeat for the end of the show.

It was now time to put on the lead vocal. My brother, Jimmy, at the time possessed a voice that had a vulnerable soulfulness about it. On our album he had used that voice to great effect as he sang songs about love and loss, war and peace, human rights, and even death. Now he was crooning about daughters all being blond ‘like their mother’ and, importantly, ‘the youngest one in curls’.  In addition, the original incarnation of the song employed the archaic ‘… ‘twas much more than a hunch’. Who talks like that? The juxtaposition of this poignant voice and cartoonish ditty was almost surrealistic. He told me later that while he was singing the lead, the bemused face of a long-haired musician, joint in his mouth, had appeared in the window of the door, his smile seeming to say – ‘Yes, we all do what we have to do to stay in the game, don’t we, brother?’

A couple of takes and Jimmy had a lead which he promptly doubled (Doubling the voices was an important part of our sound.). It was then my turn to put on the harmony part. There being no time to work out a clever part, I sang a very straight-ahead harmony line. That done, Jimmy and I then the sang the ending segment and doubled it, sharing a mic.

It was a wrap, gentlemen! We’d held our noses and done what we were supposed to do. We would make union scale as musicians and Jimmy and I would receive compensation through A.F.T.R.A. for our vocals. We exited the studio laughing about this corny concept of a show. ‘It’ll never fly!’ I remember saying.

Dishing up Revenge

It was a Friday evening. The Daltons took off for Big Bear with their little dog, Muffy in tow. We went back to the Echo Park pad to reconnect with the ladies and get dinner (most likely a bucket of Pioneer Chicken). That night we all went out to the Troubadour to watch the first performance of Richie Furay’s new band, Pogo (later changed to Poco). The group was great, tight and energetic, its country/rock sound way ahead of its time. Watching them made me yearn to get back on stage.

On Tuesday, we left the city and headed back up the mountain to the snowy cabin. This time, I got the luxury of riding shotgun. Upon arriving, there was a note on the refrigerator from Lois, informing us that she had made us a tuna casserole. She had prepared this dish for us several times before. For this we were most grateful as our meals were Spartan to say the least.

We set up the gear and began rehearsing the new material. We were striving to arrange the songs Jimmy was writing to be both exciting in live performance and recordable. A set was beginning to evolve.

After three or four hours of intense practice we broke for dinner. Seated at the large pine table, we devoured the reheated casserole. Nothing to write home about but…  not bad. After the meal, we all pitched in to clean up. Jimmy was in the act of throwing some dirty napkins away when he spotted something disturbing down at the bottom of the trash dispenser.

‘Holy shit! I don’t believe it!’ he shouted.

‘What!

‘Come and look!’

We all gathered around to see. At the bottom of the plastic bag were about a dozen or so emptied cat food tuna cans.

We were stunned and repulsed.

‘We just ate cat food?’ I asked incredulously.

Jimmy, biting his lip, nodded,

‘Ugh! Disgusting!’ Greg declared.

‘How about that for star treatment!’ Casey remarked

A feeling of rage began to brew.

‘God damn it!’ Jimmy suddenly grabbed a green ceramic plate and smashed it violently on the kitchen counter. Shards flew through the room like flak.

We stood there in silence, processing the moment, catching our breath.

After a beat Greg followed suit, dispatching an orange colored bowl with a pitch to the floor as the three of us laughed demonically. On impulse I, snatched a yellow gravy boat from a cupboard, ran into the living room and hurled it against the stone fireplace.

‘Gentlemen, gentlemen. We must maintain proper form.’ Casey said as he grabbed a turquoise teapot in his left hand and a hammer in his right and marched robotically into the living room. We all fell in behind him as he began circling the big table. He abruptly stopped and motioned for silence. Miming one of those European mechanical figures that strike a bell on a clock, he brought the hammer down hard against the pot, its fragments scattering to every corner of the room. With that all hell broke loose in an orgy of dish breaking.

We were out of control, caught up in an impulsive display of rebellion. An impetuous and juvenile act?  You bet!  But it was also a powerful symbol of a bond being broken. Our relationship with Dan – so like that of parent and child- would never be the same.

We swept up every piece of pottery, every granule we could find, piled the waste on top of the cat food cans, and dumped the bag in the outside trash bin. It was bone-numbing cold. It had begun to snow.  That night the four of us gathered around the table, smoked a joint and talked about the future. We had all felt we were on a dead-end street. Now we were prepared to take a leap.

Who Knew?

In January of 1969, the four of us marched into Dan Dalton’s Sunset office, demanding a meeting.  A few weeks earlier Sid Kessler, sensing what was up, had paid us a visit. ‘Don’t do this, guys. I know what’s happening, and I’m asking you – please, please don’t do this.’  But we were adamant in our resolve. Apparently, Sid had not spilled the beans in the interim for Dan was blind-sided.

‘So what can I do for you boys?’

‘We quit!’ Jimmy stated flat-out.

It took a moment for Dan to process what he’d just heard.  ‘What do you mean ‘you quit’?’

‘We’re leaving.’

‘Leaving what?’

Casey jumped in – ‘Management, production, the record contract… the works!’

‘This is crazy! What have you guys been smoking?’

‘No hard feelings, Dan, but it’s not working out.’ Greg offered diplomatically.

‘We had a hit record.. and the ball was dropped!’ I heard myself shout.

‘A lucky break squandered!’ Jimmy added.

‘Where’s the agent? Where are the damn bookings?’. Casey piped in

‘Okay,’ Dan confessed. ‘I admit I haven’t been the greatest manager. Maybe I’ve spread myself a little thin. But there’s nobody…’ He said, pounding the desk and pointing a finger – ‘Nobody in this town who can produce you like I can.’

The mea culpa took us by surprise. The second half of the statement landed flat.

‘We want to get away from that sound.’ Greg said with a quiet tone of finality.

Oh, that must have hurt the man’s pride. He slumped back in his chair for a moment before rallying with a comebacker. ‘I can always put together a new Peppermint Trolley Company! You’ll lose the Acta deal.’

‘Go ahead!’ Casey said. ‘We don’t need it!’

We all nodded in agreement.

As Dalton sat there in anger and humiliation, his temper began to visibly rise, his eyes flashing with an inner rage. He leaned back in the chair and began nervously tapping a pencil on the blotter. An excruciating interval of dead air seemed to hang in the room.

‘If that’s the way you feel, then get the hell out of here!’ he shouted.

Dan, seeking revenge, most likely got on the phone the moment we left the office.  A day or so later, somehow having convinced Paramount that another session was necessary, he brought in a different group of singers – a phony Peppermint Trolley Company – to record another rendition, saving only our instrumental track. We were told about this much later by someone at AFTRA or the Musician’s Local whom we had contacted when payments were not forthcoming (Only after the unions leaned on Dalton and Paramount were we finally compensated).

The acrimony would continue for months, boiling over into outright confrontation one spring night when Dan, accompanied by several associates, including Sid, to our dismay, ambushed us after a gig at a UCLA frat party, intent on confiscating our amplifiers. It was an ugly scene. We lay our scrawny selves over the cabinets, hugging with all our might, not budging until he police arrived to break up the commotion. In spite of the cops treating us like hippie trash and being more deferential to the older and straighter side, they deemed it a civil matter and called it a draw. Whatever was in our possession at that moment – about half of our equipment – we were able to keep.
Although our version of the theme song was part of the original pilot as it made the rounds of network moguls and potential sponsors, when the sitcom began airing on ABC in September of 1969, our golden voices were nowhere to be found on the track. Not that we cared much.  Hell, we didn’t even own a television set! By then, we had changed the name of the group to Bones and were becoming more and more immersed in the Counterculture. We had played dozens of pro bono rallies for peace and freedom and were well into our third month of being the featured house band at Gazzarri’s on the Strip, where we gigged six nights a week. Being totally focused on coming up with an exciting new sound and stage presence, our off time was filled with writing sessions and rehearsals.

Bones would stay together as a band for another four years, releasing two albums on Atlantic and MCA respectively. We had a minor hit and played hundreds of concerts and club dates., sharing the bill with artists like Little Richard, Canned Heat, Alice Cooper, Poco, Albert Collins, the Eagles, and many more. In spite of not finding the success we had sought, not catching that elusive ‘lucky break’. it was an exciting and creative time and I wouldn’t trade those years for anything.

As for the show that we declared would never fly, it is still in syndication as of 2020. Who knew? And that cornball, and insipid little ditty we played and sang on? Why, it’s probably as well known as the national anthem, a campy cultural touchstone for legions of loyal Brady Bunch fans. It’s one of those tunes that is so awful that it’s infectious and fun to embrace. Over the years I watched as the name of our band became the answer to a Brady Bunch trivia question. It seemed as if our music was destined to remain undiscovered and irrelevant. It irked!

That changed in 2009 with the release of ‘Beautiful Sun’ on Steve Stanley’s Now Sound label. Apparently, we also had a cult following. The CD was a comprehensive collection of all the Peppermint Trolley Company recordings (Not including the phony group releases). In the process Dan Dalton was asked to be involved and contributed some of the information in the liner notes. It gave me an opportunity to reconnect with him, and we went out to lunch several times. He had mellowed over the years.  I was able to put aside the poison of bitterness and appreciate what we had accomplished as a creative team. Time does heal.  Sadly, Dan passed in 2017.

In 2019 Sid Kessler, now a successful producer in Toronto, reached out to me. After fifty years, it still gnawed on his conscience that he hadn’t stood up for us at the time of the break-up. He wanted to apologize for what he thought was a betrayal of friendship. I was moved by his heartfelt phone call.

‘Sid,’ I said, ‘You don’t need to apologize!’
‘Listen, Danny, I feel I do.’ He said.

Looking back on our association with the Brady Bunch, my views about the show have also softened.  In 1972 Bones played an engagement at a popular rock club in Calabasas. It was owned by the brother of Maureen McCormack, the actress who played the role of Marsha Brady. She dug the band and came in on several occasions to watch and listen. She was friendly, and we chatted several times between sets. She laughed when I told her the story of our recording the song. What a small world! It made me think of the show from a different angle. The sitcom was her shot at carving out a career doing what she loved; her ‘lucky break’. Later in the seventies I would sit and watch reruns of the Brady Bunch with my young daughter, who was a big fan of the program.  Seeing it through the eyes of a child, its message of family, albeit ultra- white bread, was not a bad one. It also makes me glad – given how frequently child stars are messed up by Hollywood – to know that all the actors from the Brady Bunch have been able to land on their feet and are reaping some financial reward and fame for being part of the show.

A half century later. Brew 102, Wallach’s Music City, the flower children on the corner, Dan Dalton… All are gone, existing only in memory. It is the fate of everything and everyone.. We weave in and out of each other’s lives in ways we’re not even aware of, twisting, turning, doing our dance as we create our own little narrative. Looking back, I see that my life’s absurd intersection with a television show is a part of my narrative. I do hope you enjoyed the ride.

Okay, now. I know you’re just dying to sing.
Ahem! ‘Me, me, me..‘ All together now!

‘Here’s the story… of a lovely lady…’

D.F.

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